China appears to be planning a spaceship Mission on the unseen side of the moon. The China National Space Agency (China National Space Administration or CNSA) plans to lift off in 2020, Chang'e 4, which will carry the country's second lunar rover.
According to comments recently made by Wu Weiren, lead engineer for the lunar exploration program, the rover will explore the "dark" side of the moon that is not visible from Earth.
Although China has launched satellite launches since the 1970, the space agency of the country has made much more progress than 2000 and then, making it the third country to send 2003 astronauts to space.
2007, the CNSA sent its first spacecraft (named Chang'e 1, after the Chinese moon goddess) into lunar orbit. It was followed by Orbiter Chang'e 2 in 2010 and Chang'e 3 in 2013. The latter also carried a small rover (called Yutu) to the moon. But mechanical problems prevented the rover from traveling on the moon more than 100 meters.
Subsequent missions will go even further. Chang'e 5 will collect rock samples and bring them back to Earth.
Plans for the Chang'e 4 launch in 2020 again include the transport of a rover, as with Chang'e 3.
If everything goes according to the program, the new rover will be able to gather much more data and maybe explore the unseen side of the moon.
Because the moon is rotating around the Earth with the same speed that Earth is rotating, we are constantly watching the same side.
So we know much less about the invisible side of the moon (we call it the "dark side", which is not the case because we may not see it, but the sun is constantly seeing it) because there is no direct eye contact.
But why is China so interested in exploring the unseen side of the moon?
China is interested in taking samples to discover a sun-3 sun-isotope. This particular isotope could some day be used to build nuclear weapons or power generation.
The isotope of helium, 3, seems to be much more abundant in the moon than on Earth, where it is extremely rare. The invisible side of the moon is believed to have the highest concentrations because it is exposed to much in the solar winds, which essentially produce the sun-3.
It is not certain that this is China's goal. To collect the necessary amounts of helium-3 it needs, it will also have to prepare Chang'e 5. CNSA, meanwhile, has never openly stated that it plans to mine the helium-3 isotope.
The article was published in VOX.
